Sata port disease

[wyglif]

I've seen a lot of weird things but this one stumps me...

I built a system with an Asus P5k Pro a few months back with 320gb boot and 500gb data drives. One day out of the blue my pc took over 2 minutes to boot up and started giving errors in programs and couldn't complete a disk scan.

I nearly ordered another HD when I realized that I could move to another sata port and all was well again. Today my 3rd port died (all three on the first controller), and it always happens to the port plugged to the 320gb

I need to RMA the board of course but I am worried that maybe the 320gb drive is causing it. Is this possible or could it just be a coincidence?

Any advice? Should I replace the drive as a precaution for the sake of the new board? (I'll actually use a MSI p35 Neo2 that I have lying around)

[Clunk]

Check the cables, they are notoriously bad on the P5K series.

[wyglif]

Check the cables, they are notoriously bad on the P5K series.

I actually didn't use the included SATA cables, but I will definitely toss the one I am using now.

[smargh]

"I could move to another sata port and all was well again" .. "worried that maybe the 320gb drive is causing it"

Post hoc, ergo propter hoc.

Check your power supply voltages. What make/model and how old is it? I had a 4-year-old 24/7-usage Tagan go titsup recently - all the caps inside were bulging badly, and one of the legs on a big cap had completely disintegrated into a small clump of rust on the PCB.

[wyglif]

I have a 500w Earthwatts a few months old.

My vcore is 1.14v
3.3 = 3.31
+5 = 4.99
+12 = 11.99
CPU temp = 45C